Red Phoenix

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

The weather the day of Charlie’s funeral was perfect: warm and mild without a single cloud in the seamless blue sky.

We followed the hearse in a van, and took Charlie’s mother with us. Mrs Bradford was delightful; as wonderful as her daughter. She insisted on me calling her Elizabeth. She was over eighty years old, but still active and bright.

Simone and Michael were perfectly behaved throughout the entire proceedings, quiet and respectful. It wasn’t obvious how much of it Simone understood, though.

The Chen family plot was in a cemetery on the outskirts of London. It was in the centre of a wide expanse of lawn with towering ancient oak trees not far away. There was a small iron fence around the area. Some of the graves were obviously very old, but the plot was immaculately cared for with small hedges and a few rose bushes.

The sun shone brightly on us as Charlie received an old-fashioned farewell. I was introduced to a large number of nieces and nephews by her sister and brother, who were all as lovely as she and her mother were.

Afterwards, John took Charlie’s mother over to a park bench and sat beside her. He held her hand and spoke to her for a long time. She wept, but she smiled and nodded through the tears at some of the things he said.

‘Stop,’ John told the driver as we drove towards the exit of the cemetery. We stopped at a small, ancient, ivycovered stone cottage next to the cemetery gate. It looked like a medieval garden shed. It had a microscopic, fastidiously neat garden around it and a picket fence.

‘Emma, there’s someone here you have to meet. Leo, Michael, Simone, you stay here in the car and wait. This won’t take long.’

As soon as we approached the cottage door a tiny middle-aged European man with a shock of black hair and very pale skin dashed out with a huge grin on his face. He bobbed obsequiously a few times to John, smiling with delight. Then he pointed the grin at me and I felt it.

I couldn’t pick him. He wasn’t a demon, although he did have something demonic about him. He also wasn’t a normal human being. He was definitely some sort of supernatural creature, but I hadn’t seen his like before. I inwardly compared him to Jade; nope, not a dragon. Not a stone, either.

He noticed my regard and his grin widened. John waited patiently for me to work it out, amused.

I opened my Inner Eye to examine the creature internally and he froze. His face became a mask of horror.

‘That is extremely bad manners, Emma,’ John said quietly. ‘You can destroy lesser creatures by doing that to them. Unless the creature attacks you, turning your Inner Eye on them really shouldn’t be necessary.’

‘Sorry,’ I said to the creature. ‘I didn’t know.’

John gestured towards the little man. ‘Apologies, Franklin. That was only the second time my Lady has done that, and I didn’t know she could do it with such ease. I don’t think she’ll do it again.’

The little man bowed crisply and smiled again. ‘Have you worked me out yet, my Lady?’ he said. ‘The Dark Lord says that you have not been in Europe for any length of time, and so would not have encountered anything like me before.’ He studied me carefully, his eyes sparkling. ‘So this is her, eh?’ His voice gained a hungry edge. ‘Powerful. Sweet. Delicious.’ He turned and gestured. ‘Come inside, I have tea.’

‘You vowed to stay off the hard stuff, Franklin,’ John said as we went through the tiny picket gate to the little cottage.

‘I have not had a drop of anything stronger than bull in over twenty-five years, my Lord,’ the little man said. ‘I swear.’

‘I can smell white bull on you,’ John said meaningfully. ‘Are you sure?’

‘All bought and paid for, I assure you, my Lord,’ the little man said with glee. ‘I have been exceptionally good.’ He turned and held out his hands. ‘Look at me! In the sunshine.’

‘I suppose that speaks for itself,’ John said. ‘Come on in, Emma, and meet Franklin. He has been looking after the Chen family plot for…’ He hesitated. ‘How long, Franklin?’

‘About two hundred and thirty years now, my Lord,’ Franklin said with satisfaction. ‘I can remember when this was far out on the edge of the city.’

We entered the cottage. Franklin obviously lived in it. It had a tiny bed, a little table and a stove. A door led out the back of the cottage. It was Spartan but spotlessly clean. A checked tablecloth covered the table, with a small vase of daisies in the middle.

‘Please, my Lord, my Lady, sit,’ Franklin said, gesturing to a couple of chairs at the table. ‘So sorry to hear about the Retainer, my Lord. Circumstances are very difficult right now, aren’t they.’

John didn’t say anything, he just motioned for me to sit. Franklin turned and filled the kettle, then put it on his tiny stove.

‘All right, I give up,’ I said. ‘What are you?’

Franklin busied himself pulling tea cups and a teapot out of the cupboard. He turned and put the cups and saucers on the table. He stopped and smiled at me over the checked tablecloth. ‘Old-fashioned Eastern European vampire, my Lady. Not surprised I’m the first one you’ve ever met,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Been given a second chance by the Dark Lord here, and doing my best.’

John leaned back slightly and put his hand on the table. ‘Tell the truth, Franklin. You are neither old-fashioned, Eastern European, nor a vampire.’

Franklin’s smile didn’t shift. ‘Uzbek is close enough, my Lord. My dietary habits…well, you know. And I’m very old now.’

‘When Marco Polo returned to Europe, there was some interest shown in his tales. The demons here in Europe knew that the ones in China existed, but hadn’t had much contact. Franklin here,’ John gestured across the table, ‘is one of the first products of experimentation.’

‘Last one of my type in existence, too,’ Franklin said without rancour. ‘Those were the days, eh, my Lord?’

‘That particular part of history was very unpleasant here in Europe and you know it,’ John said grimly.

‘Not for us.’ Franklin’s grin didn’t shift. ‘More of a golden era for us, my Lord.’

‘Experiments?’ I said.

John’s face was still grim. ‘Demon Lords are constantly looking for ways to improve the stock produced by the Mothers. Some of their recent activities are rather disturbing. Franklin is one of the first products of interbreeding. Bad idea. The results were high maintenance, fragile, unable to hold their shape for very long, unable to tolerate bright light, and easy to destroy. Their metabolisms were so fast and their digestive systems so delicate that they could only ingest plasma.’

‘You actually have a digestive system?’ I asked Franklin. ‘What level are you?’

‘Oh, very good, madam,’ Franklin said. ‘You have been studying us. I am level seventy equivalent.’

‘Whoa! You don’t look that big. You’re huge!’

‘Big but weak,’ John said. ‘Interesting abilities, but easy to destroy. I don’t think they tried Eastern-Western hybrids again.’

‘Eastern-Western?’ I said.

John nodded. ‘They don’t normally have much to do with each other. Professional rivalry. Western demons don’t have anything to do with me; I’m an Eastern Shen.’ He smiled slightly. ‘Your home has Southern Shen, very old, very powerful. Much older than me. Never met a single one. We are strongest nearest to our centres; the demons are as well.’ He gestured towards Franklin again. ‘Interbreeding between the types is always a bad idea; the results are usually extremely weak.’

‘I am lucky to still be here,’ Franklin said as he passed a tea cup across the table to me.

‘Vampires,’ I said. Franklin nodded, but John looked impatient.

‘Demon hybrids,’ John said. ‘Most of them don’t survive. Some are disastrous malformed atrocities. Others emerge new and powerful. There have been some recent experiments where the results have been appalling.’

‘Experiments?’ I said as I picked up my tea cup and studied it suspiciously. Perfectly normal tea. I took a sip. Very good quality Ceylon too.

‘Experiments?’ Franklin echoed, his smile disappearing.

‘Not just animals can be engineered,’ John said, his voice very grim. ‘The King doesn’t approve. He’s a traditionalist. But there are some activities out there that are causing us a great deal of concern.’

‘That is very bad news, my Lord,’ Franklin said faintly. He flopped into a chair across the table from us. ‘Very bad news indeed.’

‘Vampires. So Western supernatural creatures are just as real,’ I said.

‘Of course,’ John said. ‘Each region has its own.’

‘Better give me some tips on the different types then,’ I said. ‘Just in case Simone wants to study overseas.’

‘Good idea,’ John said. ‘I don’t know how they’ll react to her.’ He leaned back. ‘The world is becoming a very small place. Five hundred years ago, contact between China and the West was rare and intermittent. Two hundred years ago, it would take months to travel from one place to another. Now, it only takes a matter of hours. We Shen are starting to travel around. More powerful Shen such as myself can even spend extended periods of time in different areas. The bigger demons do too. I think sometimes they materialise in the holds of aircraft and ride them from one place to another.’

‘Wouldn’t that take them too far from their centre?’ I said.

Franklin broke in. ‘Sometimes being far from your centre is better than not existing at all, my Lady, when you have angered the one you serve.’

‘Your own little demon was too small to do that, Emma,’ John said. ‘Her only hope was to join one of us.’

‘You are taming demons already?’ Franklin said with disbelief. ‘Has she attained the Way already, my Lord? She does not appear to have.’

‘No,’ John said. ‘She is just a human being, but a most remarkable one.’

‘You owe me a gold coin,’ I said.

‘A gold coin?’ Franklin said.

‘Every time someone says she is extraordinary, they have to give her a gold coin,’ John said. ‘It started with Kwan Yin. Now everybody has to do it. How many do you have now, Emma?’

‘Six,’ I said.

‘Dear me, but she is enough to make even the most well-behaved vampire fall off the wagon,’ Franklin said with awe.

‘Try me,’ I growled. ‘I could probably take your head off with my bare hands.’

‘Delicious,’ Franklin said, looking me in the eye and grinning evilly. He held out a plate. ‘Biscuit?’

I wrapped my black silken coils around the eggs. I stroked them with my hands. They were so beautiful. My eggs.

I used my hands to polish them gently. I could see them through the shells. There, the first one: tawny brown hair. Fine pale skin. Exquisite. The second: a blonde mop, golden skin. So beautiful. I sighed with bliss. And there, the most perfect of all, the third one: golden light brown hair and skin like porcelain, clearly visible through the shell.

I stretched my fingers over them and rolled them gently. The nestlings inside shifted as I moved them, bright eyes unseeing. They were all so perfect.

I pulled my black coils around them more tightly, so that I could lean on myself. I carefully groomed my scales, making sure that the gaps between them were spotlessly clean. It felt good.

I looked up. The ceiling was invisible in the darkness of the chamber. I didn’t care; I was safe there, miles below the surface, with my gleaming, transparent eggs. I could see another Mother on the other side of the chamber, around her eggs as well.

Stay away, bitch. These are mine.

I curled over my beautiful cool coils and sighed. I dangled my arms. I was bored. I wished the King would bring me a toy to play with. I smiled to myself. I thought about what sort of toy I would like to play with. And exactly what sort of game I would like to play.

I shot upright with horror. I threw the covers off my legs to make sure.

Then I ran down the hall to the upstairs bathroom and was violently sick.

Ms Kwan appeared almost immediately as I held my hand on the pearl and concentrated. She knew that there wasn’t a problem with John; she could probably sense it. She saw my face and came to sit next to me at the Kensington house’s dining table.

‘I had a dream,’ I whispered. ‘I dreamed I was a Snake Mother. And in the eggs…’ I choked. ‘Were Simone. And Michael. And someone else, I don’t know.’

She didn’t seem at all concerned. ‘Did the eggs hatch in the dream?’

‘No.’ I could barely breathe.

‘It was just a dream, Emma,’ she said softly.

‘Ms Kwan, when a demon attains perfection, and they can live a human life, what happens to them? Are they born as a human child?’

‘I cannot answer that question, I am sorry, Emma. It is not our place to tell you what lies beyond. You all must find that for yourselves. You wonder if it is possible that you are a Snake Mother that has attained perfection. My answer is: I cannot tell you. You must discover this for yourself. But even if you are, it is irrelevant for what you are now.’

I folded my arms on the table and dropped my head onto them. I looked up at her miserably. ‘Would a demon remember being a demon?’

She just shook her head sadly.

‘Am I a snake demon?’ I whispered.

Ms Kwan held her hand out and concentrated. A live white mouse appeared on her palm. ‘Take it,’ she said gently.

I took the mouse. It had adorable white whiskers. Its little nose wiggled as it smelled my hand. Its tiny feet were cold. I ran my other finger over the top of its head, bending its translucent pink ears. I’d forgotten how much fun mice were. I’d always felt guilty about feeding them to my pet snake.

‘Eat it.’

I glanced sharply at her, then collapsed over the table laughing, carefully holding the mouse so that I wouldn’t hurt it. I laughed so much that tears sprang from my eyes.

I gently passed the mouse back to her. She concentrated again and it disappeared. ‘Sorry,’ I whispered into my arms. ‘Not a problem.’ I looked up. She was gone.

I shot upright in the middle of the night. If it had been nothing more than a dream, then why had she asked me if the eggs had hatched?